ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The No. 16-ranked University of Michigan women's tennis team punched its ticket to the ITA Kick-Off championship match after sweeping Brown, 7-0, on Saturday (Jan. 26) in the first round of action at the Varsity Tennis Center. It is the fourth consecutive season that U-M has advanced to the championship match.

Michigan took the early match lead by winning the doubles point with wins at No. 1 and No. 2. Michigan's top pair of freshman Ronit Yurovsky(New Kensington, Pa./Plum) and junior Brooke Bolender(Delray Beach, Fla./Kaplan) secured the team's first win on the doubles court, breaking Brown in the first game en route to an 8-2 decision.

With the remaining two matches on the court, U-M's No. 2 duo of senior Mimi Nguyen(Long Beach, Calif./Millikan) and sophomore Sarah Lee (Los Angeles, Calif./Campbell Hall) were the first to finish with an 8-2 win. The No. 3 match, featuring sophomores Emina Bektas(Indianapolis, Ind./New Braunfels) and Kristen Dodge(Barrington, Ill./Barrington), was abandoned with U-M holding a 7-4 lead.

Switching to singles, Michigan won all six first sets to take control of the team match. Freshman Amy Zhu(Newark, Del./Laurel Springs) put Michigan's next point on the board with a 6-0, 3-0 win at No. 5 when Laura Wiley retired. Lee was the next Wolverine off court with a 6-1, 6-2 win at No. 3, putting the Maize and Blue on the brink of clinching the team match.

Bektas providing the clinching point, finishing about two minutes after Lee with a 6-3, 6-1 win at No. 1 over Misia Krasowski. With the team victory in hand, Nguyen, Dodge and Bolender finished off their respective opponents in straight sets as U-M did not drop a set on the afternoon.

Michigan will play for a berth to the ITA National Team Indoor Championships tomorrow (Sunday, Jan. 27), taking on either South Carolina or Missouri at 2 p.m.